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Mohammedan cab drivers filling the void

This story is both refreshing and infuriating. Refreshing, because it's nice to see progress being made against America's in-your-face smut parade. Infuriating, because it took an offended group of Muslims to get this done while American Christians can barely manage a half-hearted shrug. What an embarrassment!

NEW YORK, September 23, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) - New York’s Muslim taxi cab drivers are celebrating after authorities granted their request for the right to yank prominent advertisements for strip clubs from the top of their vehicles.

The New York Post reported last week that the city’s Taxi & Limousine Commission (TLC) granted cab drivers total veto power over the content of their roof ads, a decision the Post says delighted “scores” of drivers from more than one faith background.

“We are Muslims, and we do not like the ads!” cab driver Mohamed Tahir, 66, told the paper. His vehicle is topped with an advertisement for “Flashdancers Gentlemen’s Club.” “If I had another ad, I’d change it right away! It bothers many of us,” he said.

The content of the ads is normally determined by the owners of the taxi medallions - the aluminum frames bolted on the cab roof - who earn about $125 a month from the ads.

TLC Commissioner David Yassky strongly endorsed the change. “If you’re a taxi driver who owns his or her own car, you take it home, your neighbors see it,” said Yassky. “This is an appropriate and measured step that gives the driver the authority to screen out ads.”

Another Muslim driver complained that the ad on his vehicle, which is also his primary mode of private transportation, was so embarrassing that he started attending his mosque on foot instead. “People getting out of the mosque would see the disgusting things,” said Osman Chowdhury.

Driver Mohan Singh said the signs even affected his 6-year-old granddaughter, who said she wanted to be a “dancer” after seeing the Flashdancers ad atop Singh’s taxi, something that infuriated him. “We should keep [the advertisement] there to tell the children that it is good?” he asked.

Comments (20)

Did Christian taxi drivers really "shrug" about this or were there just not enough of them to make their voices heard? My impression is that Muslims have a pretty noticeable presence in the taxi driving world, all over the country. It's also possible that the commission was more likely to listen to a "victim group." I'd be curious as to whether Christian drivers had previously complained. A single Christian driver might simply have been told that that's the way it is, and there's nothing to be done about it. Presumably it took some sort of organized opposition among the drivers to make people even think it could be stopped. The story at least hints that there are Christian drivers pleased at the decision, so presumably they weren't previously shrugging.

Did Christian taxi drivers really "shrug" about this or were there just not enough of them to make their voices heard?

I don't know, but nevermind the drivers. How about the passengers? The taxi business owners? The neighbors? The city officials? The people who tolerate these "clubs" to begin with? Etc. We are where we are because American Christians have been asleep for a long, long time.

It's also possible that the commission was more likely to listen to a "victim group."

Point taken, Lydia. In fact my default assumption would be that Christian complaints would fall on deaf ears. Perhaps those of us who still care have just given up.

......my default assumption would be that Christian complaints would fall on deaf ears.

There are good reasons for believing this assumption to be true in many cases.

In this morning's papers I read that "in order to avoid offending non-Christians", the BBC is to drop the terms AD and BC and use Common Era terms. The BBC doesn't reveal how many people are offended, if any, by the familiar Anno Domini and Before Christ - which at least reflect a common Christian heritage in the Western world.

It would be useless to protest because the task of assuaging the imaginary sensitivities of non-Christians trumps every other consideration in a case like this. It would also be useless to point out that the terms Common Era and Before Common Era are meaningful only because a reference to the life and times of Jesus Christ is implied in them.

Of course what the BBC will never admit are hidden anti-Christian motives in their eagerness to avoid 'alienating' non-Christians.

I don't know, but nevermind the drivers. How about the passengers? The taxi business owners? The neighbors? The city officials? The people who tolerate these "clubs" to begin with? Etc. We are where we are because American Christians have been asleep for a long, long time.

Perhaps those of us who still care have just given up.

In New York City, I would expect that for an individual Christian, it might indeed not be worth it to put a lot of energy into objecting to this kind of evil, as opposed to simply trying to get out of that city as quickly as possible. What we see here, I would say, is that there is not a critical mass of serious Christians among the business owners, and they are the people with the most direct power to do something about this. Probably what this means is that if any Christians did own the business that was accepting these horrible ads, they should have told their partners that either the ads came down or they would leave the business. Maybe there were no Christians among the business owners, however.

The changes in society that allowed this all happened, my guess is, a long time ago. What we're faced with in that city is probably not so much a situation in which Christians are asleep as a situation in which Christians constitute a small and powerless minority.

"Presumably it took some sort of organized opposition among the drivers to make people even think it could be stopped."

Bingo. The ruling applies only to the owners of vehicles who lease the medallion. These are a small sub-set of taxi drivers in New York who own their cabs and it makes economic sense to share the ownership. I surmise that circumstances favor certain immigrant groups.

No need to go into default persecution mode. Present demographic realities make it likely that socially conservative Christians and socially liberal Muslims are unlikely to be hacking a cab in NYC.

This is interesting. Compare the Lifesitenews article with the NY Post article to which it links.

LSN,
"The content of the ads is normally determined by the owners of the taxi medallions - the aluminum frames bolted on the cab roof - who earn about $125 a month from the ads."

Post,
"Previously, the owners of the taxi medallion -- often someone other than the car’s owner -- could decide what ads went up."

It seems that LSN added "the aluminum frames bolted on the cab roof" as definitional for "medallion" (I also checked the NYT and Adweek articles) which is strange as a NYC taxi medallion, issued by the City's Taxi and Limousine Commission, is a plaque that is, I recall, fixed to the hood. It appears that someone at LSN made that up. A small point and of no consequence here but instructive as to their general trustworthiness.

BTW, and as always, economics is basic. A beef with owners is that the medallion owner pockets all the ad revenue. Some hope this is an opening shot in changing that arrangement. A cynic might wonder if our socially conservative cabbies would have been so passionate in their opposition to the ads if some of those dollars had been theirs? Just asking.

Al, my guess is that the Post incorrectly identified the roof fixture as a "medallion", LSN picked it up without question but wanted to clarify that we're not talking about the medallion on the hood. That's good journalism. And I don't blame them for not wanting to hastily change the terminology in the original story.

It wasn't in the Post article. Everyone in NYC knows what a taxi medallion is. And, in any case, "good journalism" isn't passing on bad information. Failing to correct bad information is how we got to our present corrupt MSM state and why we can really trust any single source.

It actually is as it appears the writer made it up on the fly. In the age of the google there is simply no excuse for not sweating the small stuff and this isn't that small as the TLC medallion is central to the story.

Drivers who lease cabs from medallion owners who also own the cab are out of luck. Drivers who own both the cab and the medallion can call their own shots. For the guys in the middle; those who own their cabs but lease the medallion, this is sort of cool. Driving a cab is hard work, sometimes dangerous, and not all that remunerative. Reporters are supposed to work too.

Now, I understand how a commie like moi is going to be more interested in how the situation ties into the factors of production than just being satisfied with a simple morality play, but if you are writing a story and it involves folks who own a vehicle and there seems to be other folks who own thingees that go on top of the vehicle from which the thingee owners derive 100% of the benefit and the vehicle owners none; well, that would lead to some natural questions, no? The bent of a report's mind is supposed to go there.

William, your point demonstrates one of the very real liberal/conservative differences. Conservatives just aren't interested in the nuances around public policy which is what one would expect from an orientation for which first principles are everything and facts on the ground count for little.

BTW, if the number of cabs carrying these signs decline, the rate to clear the market should rise. Also I assumed a gradient, i.e. that there are cabbies who wouldn't carry a sign under any circumstances and those whose religious devotion would fluctuate on a sliding scale - you know, just like folks everywhere.

Comrade al said: "but if you are writing a story and it involves folks who own a vehicle and there seems to be other folks who own thingees that go on top of the vehicle from which the thingee owners derive 100% of the benefit and the vehicle owners none;"

If the cab owner leases a medallion without obtaining any benefit from it, why does he lease it then? I assume there is no law in NY that says every cab must have an ad on its roof. There must be a benefit to it. It surely increases his fuel bill in the very least. What does that have to do with poor earnings of cab drivers?
Are NY taxi drivers the only people with income issues? Is income supplementation not a benefit?

"simple morality play," because "Driver Mohan Singh said the signs even affected his 6-year-old granddaughter, who said she wanted to be a “dancer” after seeing the Flashdancers ad atop Singh’s taxi," is really a simple, issue ... no big deal at all. Morality.... pffft, stupid outmoded concern and not part of the issue of economic exploitation at all, nor of child exploitation, nor of the individual.

At least the old Eastern Bloc Commies pretended to care about children and their parents' moral values.

"If the cab owner leases a medallion without obtaining any benefit from it,"

William, meet Zoom. Zoom, read closer, the medallion is license issued by the NYCTLC. One of the ways in which one may become a legal taxi driver in NYC is to own a vehicle and lease the medallion. It seems that part of the lease agreement is to require the lessee to attach a sign holder to the roof of his vehicle to the sole benefit of the lessor.

"What does that have to do with poor earnings of cab drivers?"

The arrangement appears to be pure rent extraction. As such it creates a market inefficiency and artificially lowers income prospects for the vehicle owner/driver.

"Are NY taxi drivers the only people with income issues?"

Of course not but I'm unaware of a "one solution fixes all" solution to that problem so we deal with it case by case.

"At least the old Eastern Bloc Commies pretended to care about children and their parents' moral values."

Conservatives just aren't interested in the nuances around public policy which is what one would expect from an orientation for which first principles are everything and facts on the ground count for little.

Does this mean that for liberals the facts on the ground are everything but first principles count for little?

Are you saying, al, that to drive a cab in NY you have to lease the medallion?

"Big deal"
It actually is as it appears the writer made it up on the fly. In the age of the google there is simply no excuse for not sweating the small stuff and this isn't that small as the TLC medallion is central to the story.

That comes after you'd said in your previous comment that it was "A small point and of no consequence here."

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